The Excluded ‘Indigenous’? The Implications of Multi-Ethnic Policies for Water Reform in Bolivia

Ethnodevelopment: Social Movements, Creating Experts and Professionalising Indigenous Knowledge in Ecuador

“…These classroom discussions occurred during the Bolivian municipal elections in 1999 when several students were standing for public office. They also coincided with the start of mass mobilisations against water privatisation in Cochabamba (see Laurie, Andolina and Radcliffe 2002). A number of students were important actors in the Committee of Defence for Water, subsequently reconstituted as the Coordinator for the Defence of Water and Life which led to the now internationally famous, Cochabamba water wars in April 2000.…”

“…As active subjects in neoliberal development, these actors are expected to be self-governing, self-motivated and focused on de-centralised managerial efficiency. While there is growing diversity in the location of development professionalisation, support for training indigenous people as development experts in the Andes is highly transnational (Laurie, Andolina and Radcliffe 2003). As a result, new indigenous expert elites are emerging from the ranks of the social movements and becoming important advocates in transnational development and human rights circuits (Brysk 2000;Lloyd 1998).…”

The Politics of Resource Extraction

“…Laurie et al 2002]). The establishment of TCOs under the LPP was intended in part to resolve outstanding land disputes involving indigenous peoples in the Amazon and Chaco lowlands, according to Bolivia's obligations under ILO 169.…”

Systemic Conditions Affecting the Universalisation of Water and Sanitation Services: A Sociological Exploration

“…Understandably, the situation is much worse in poorer countries. There are several key factors that are often interwoven in complex combinations, including economic, gender, age, and ethnic inequalities (Laurie, 2007;Laurie, Radcliffe, & Andolina, 2002;Swyngedouw, 2004;Swyngedouw, Kaïka, & Castro, 2002;Webb & Iskandarani, 1998). For instance, regarding the latter, a recent study on the problems affecting the access to WSS by the Aymara indigenous community in La Paz-El Alto, Bolivia, conceptualised the ethnically grounded structural inequalities embedded in the city's WSS system as ''water racism'' (Crespo Flores, 2007).…”